Saturday, September 08, 2007

Schaar or Schäuble?

In our world of muted criticisms and careful policies, it is good to see a solid and forthright response from a government official about the Islamist threat:

In an interview with the mass-circulation daily Bild Zeitung, Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble warned of the danger posed by radical converts to Islam. "One thinks that people who have grown up here and who enjoy the benefits of our free society are immune," he said. "But some are susceptible to radicalization. These are dangerous, fanatical people with a high degree of criminal energy. That is a great concern for me." ...

Schäuble renewed Thursday his calls for online spying, saying that terrorists are increasingly using the Internet to plan their operations. Authorities must have the option to secretly spy on computers "in strictly justified exceptional cases," Schäuble told the German broadcaster ARD. (der Speigel)

Schäuble is thinking with a post-9/11 mindset, but of course there are others who are responding to Germany's brush with catastrophe with pure 9/10 perspective:

But the critics have opened up on Schäuble this week. Federal Commissioner for Data Protection Peter Schaar wondered in an interview with the Frankfurter Rundschau on Thursday how the high-court mandated "core privacy" can be maintained in light of such a strategy. He also had serious doubts about the suitability of the government sending out virus-laden e-mails.

"The police cannot be allowed to present itself as the Cologne Youth Office in order to plant forensic software on the computers of those being investigated," he said. "That is absolutely not allowed."

Representatives from both the Greens and the business-friendly Free Democrats likewise blasted the idea, with FDP domestic policy expert Max Stadler calling for parliament to step in to block it. (der Speigel)

So what is allowed, Herr Schaar?

Our very freedoms are weapons in the Islamists' hands, and many are content to simply have these weapons, these freedoms, turned on us. If the Islamists succeed, our freedoms will be no more, crushed under Sharia law.

So what's our choice? Stay true to the letter of our freedoms and side with Schaar, or risk everything to defend our freedoms and side with Schäuble. Those who are with the former, who are with the ACLU, the German Greens and the ideologues of the Left do, are with Fritz G., Daniel S. and Adem Y., the three arrested jihad suspects in Germany.

German officials say there are at least seven more of this cell out there. Who do you trust to capture them, Schaar or Schäuble?

"Thank you for the "Voice of the Victims films. The students really liked them, and it means so much to them to hear real stories and not watch a cheesy drama like so many other videos."
— High school teacher.